Note:Electra D'Aplièse seems to be the woman with everything. Yet beneath the veneer, her already tenuous control over her state of mind has been rocked by the death of her father, Pa Salt, the elusive billionaire who adopted his six daughters from across the globe. Struggling to cope, she turns to alcohol and drugs to ease the pain, and as those around her fear for her health, Electra receives a letter from a stranger who claims to be her grandmother. In 1939, Cecily Huntley-Morgan arrives in Kenya from New York to nurse a broken heart. Staying with her godmother on the shores of Lake Naivasha, she meets Bill Forsythe. When disaster strikes and war is imminent, Cecily decides she has no choice but to accept Bill's proposal. Moving up into the Wanjohi Valley, and with Bill away, Cecily finds herself isolated and alone. Until she discovers a new-born baby abandoned in the woods next to her farmhouse.General adult

Note:Translated from the Swedish'What are you going to do now?' 'I will be the hunter and not the hunted.' Lisbeth Salander's mentor and protector Holger Palmgren is dead, and she has been gone from Stockholm since his funeral. All summer, Mikael Blomkvist has been plagued by the fear that Salander's enemies will come after her. He should, perhaps, be more concerned for himself. In the pocket of an unidentified homeless man, who died with the name of a Swedish government minister on his lips, the police find a list of telephone numbers. Among them, the contact for Millennium magazine and the investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist. Following the scorched trail of her twin sister Camilla to Moscow, Salander nevertheless continues to watch over her old friend. Soon Blomkvist will need her help. But first, she has an old score to settle; and fresh outrage to avenge.General adult

Note:A skinny young boy is found dead - his body carelessly stuffed into wheelie bin. Detective Superintendent Alan Banks and his team are called to investigate. Who is the boy, and where did he come from? Was he discarded as rubbish, or left as a warning to someone? He looks Middle Eastern, but no one on the East Side Estate has seen him before. As the local press seize upon an illegal immigrant angle, and the national media the story of another stabbing, the police are called to investigate a less newsworthy death: a middle-aged heroin addict found dead of an overdose in another estate, scheduled for redevelopment. Banks finds the threads of each case seem to be connected to the other, and to the dark side of organised crime in Eastvale. Does another thread link to his friend Zelda, who is facing her own dark side? The truth may be more complex - or much simpler - than it seems.General adult

Note:Back when Harry Bosch was just a rookie homicide detective, he had an inspiring mentor who taught him to take the work personally and light the fire of relentlessness for every case. Now that mentor, J.J. Thompson, is dead, but after his funeral his widow hands Bosch a murder book that Thompson took with him when he left the LAPD 20 years before - the unsolved killing of a troubled young man in an alley used for drug deals. Bosch brings the murder book to Renée Ballard and asks her to help him find what about the case lit Thompson's fire all those years ago. That will be their starting point. The bond between Bosch and Ballard tightens as they become a formidable investigation team. And they soon arrive at a worrying question: Did Thompson steal the murder book to work the case in retirement, or to make sure it never got solved?General adult

Note:When human remains are discovered in the grounds of an old convent, it quickly becomes clear that someone has been using the site as their personal burial ground. But with the convent abandoned long ago and the remains dating back many years, could this be the work of more than one obsessive killer? It's an investigation that throws up more questions as the evidence mounts, and after their last case ended catastrophically, Tony Hill and Carol Jordan can only watch from afar. As they deal with the consequences of previous actions, someone with a terrifying routine is biding their time - and both Tony and Carol find themselves closer to the edge than they have ever been before.General adult

Note:For 22 years Quincy Miller has sat on Death Row without friends, family or legal representation. He was accused of killing a Keith Russo, a lawyer in a small Florida town. But there were no witnesses and no motive. Just the fact that Quincy was black in an all-white town and that a blood-splattered torch was found in the boot of his car. A torch he swore was planted. A torch that conveniently disappeared from evidence just before his trial. But the police photographs of the torch were enough. In the eyes of the law Quincy is guilty and, no matter how often he protests his innocence, his punishment will be death. Finally, after 22 years, an innocence lawyer and minister, Cullen Post, takes on his case. But there were powerful and ruthless people behind Russo's murder. They prefer that an innocent man goes to his death than one of them.General adult

Note:England, late 1930s, and Alice Wright - restless, stifled - makes an impulsive decision to marry wealthy American Bennett van Cleve and leave her home and family behind. But stuffy, disapproving Baileyville, Kentucky, where her husband favours work over his wife, and is dominated by his overbearing father, is not the adventure - or the escape - that she hoped for. That is, until she meets Margery O'Hare - daughter of a notorious felon and a troublesome woman the town wishes to forget. Margery's on a mission to spread the wonder of books and reading to the poor and lost - and she needs Alice's help. Trekking alone under big open skies, through wild mountain forests, Alice, Margery and their fellow sisters of the trail discover freedom, friendship - and a life to call their own.General adult

Note:Warm, funny, life-affirming and true, 'The Best Things' is the joyous debut novel from much-loved comedian, writer, actor and presenter Mel Giedroyc. It's the story of a family who lose everything, only to find themselves, and each other, along the way. Sally and Frank Parker have it all. Then one day, because of Frank, they don't. As the bailiffs move in and the money runs out, Sally realises that she and her children don't have a clue about how to survive. Or do they? The Parkers are about to discover that the best things in life aren't things at all.General adult

Note:A trusted colleague and friend. A mother. A wife. Neve Connolly is all these things. She has also made mistakes; some small, some unconsciously done, some large, some deliberate. She is only human, after all. But now one mistake is spiralling out of control and Neve is bringing those around her into immense danger. She can't tell the truth. So how far is she prepared to go to protect those she loves. And who does she really know? And who can she trust? A liar. A cheat. A threat. Neve Connolly is all these things. Could she be a murderer?General adult

Note:It can be hard keeping secrets in a tight-knit neighbourhood. In a tranquil, leafy suburb of ordinary streets - one where everyone is polite and friendly - an anonymous note has been left at some of the houses. I'm so sorry. My son has been getting into people's houses. He's broken into yours'. Who is this boy, and what might he have uncovered? As whispers start to circulate, suspicion mounts. And when a missing local woman is found murdered, the tension reaches breaking point. Who killed her? Who knows more than they're telling? And how far will all these very nice people go to protect their secrets? Maybe you don't know your neighbour as well as you thought you did.General adult

Note:In a nameless city, two ruthless rival criminal gangs, one Albanian, the other Ukrainian, are competing for control. But they hadn't counted on Jack Reacher arriving on their patch. Reacher is trained to notice things. He's on a Greyhound bus, watching an elderly man sleeping in his seat, with a fat envelope of cash hanging out of his pocket. Another passenger is watching too - obviously hoping to get rich quick. As the mugger makes his move, Reacher steps in. The old man is grateful, yet he turns down Reacher's offer to help him home. He's vulnerable, scared, and clearly in big, big trouble. What hold could the gangs possibly have on the old guy? Will Reacher sit back and let bad things happen? Or can he twist the situation to everyone's benefit?General adult

Note:Her beauty saved her life - and condemned her. Cilka is just sixteen years old when she is taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp, in 1942. The Commandant at Birkenau, Schwarzhuber, notices her long beautiful hair, and forces her separation from the other women prisoners. Cilka learns quickly that power, even unwillingly given, equals survival. After liberation, Cilka is charged as a collaborator for sleeping with the enemy and sent to Siberia. But what choice did she have? And where did the lines of morality lie for Cilka, who was sent to Auschwitz when still a child? In a Siberian prison camp, Cilka faces challenges both new and horribly familiar, including the unwanted attention of the guards. But when she makes an impression on a woman doctor, Cilka is taken under her wing. Cilka begins to tend to the ill in the camp, struggling to care for them under brutal conditions.General adult

Note:William Warwick seriesWilliam Warwick has always wanted to be a detective and decides that rather than become a barrister like his father and his sister, he will join London's Metropolitan Police Force. After graduating from university, William begins a career that will define his life: from his early months on the beat under his mentor, Constable Fred Yates, to his first high-stakes case as a fledgling detective in Scotland Yard's arts and antiquities squad. Investigating the theft of a priceless Rembrandt painting from the Fitzmolean Museum, he meets Beth Rainsford, a research assistant at the gallery who he falls hopelessly in love with, even as Beth guards a secret of her own that she's terrified will come to light. While William follows the trail of the missing masterpiece, he comes up against art collector Miles Faulkner and his lawyer, Booth Watson QC, who are willing to bend the law to breaking point to stay one step ahead.General adult

Note:James is getting on a bit and needs full-time help. So Phoebe and Robert, his middle-aged offspring, employ Mandy, who seems willing to take him off their hands. But as James regales his family with tales of Mandy's virtues, their shopping trips, and the shared pleasure of their journeys to garden centres, Phoebe and Robert sense something is amiss. Is this really their father, the distant figure who never once turned up for a sports day, now happily chortling over cuckoo clocks and television soaps? Then something happens that throws everything into new relief, and Phoebe and Robert discover that life most definitely does not stop for the elderly. It just moves onto a very different plane - changing all the stories they thought they knew so well.General adult

Note:In a large house in London's fashionable Chelsea, a baby is awake in her cot. Well-fed and cared for, she is happily waiting for someone to pick her up. In the kitchen lie three decomposing corpses. Close to them is a hastily scrawled note. They've been dead for several days. Who has been looking after the baby? And where did they go? Two entangled families. A house with the darkest of secrets.General adult

Note:1956. A celebrated Russian author is writing a book, Doctor Zhivago, which could spark dissent in the Soviet Union. The Soviets, afraid of its subversive power, ban it. But in the rest of the world it's fast becoming a sensation. The CIA plans to use the book to tip the Cold War in its favour. Their agents are not the usual spies, however. Two typists - the charming, experienced Sally and the talented novice Irina - are charged with the mission of a lifetime: to smuggle Doctor Zhivago back into Russia by any means necessary. It will not be easy. There are people willing to die for this book - and agents willing to kill for it. But they cannot fail - as this book has the power to change history.General adult

Note:1468. A young priest, Christopher Fairfax, arrives in a remote Exmoor village to conduct the funeral of his predecessor. The land around is strewn with ancient artefacts - coins, fragments of glass, human bones - which the old parson used to collect. Did his obsession with the past lead to his death? As Fairfax is drawn more deeply into the isolated community, everything he believes - about himself, his faith and the history of his world - is tested to destruction.General adult

Note:One winter's afternoon on Hampstead Heath in 1980, Elise Morceau meets Constance Holden and quickly falls under her spell. Connie is bold and alluring, a successful writer whose novel is being turned into a major Hollywood film. Elise follows Connie to LA, a city of strange dreams and swimming pools and late-night gatherings of glamorous people. But whilst Connie thrives on the heat and electricity of this new world where everyone is reaching for the stars and no one is telling the truth, Elise finds herself floundering. When she overhears a conversation at a party that turns everything on its head, Elise makes an impulsive decision that will change her life forever. Three decades later, Rose Simmons is seeking answers about her mother, who disappeared when she was a baby.General adult

Note:Maps on lining papersSunday Times bestselling author of the Shetland and Vera Stanhope series, Ann Cleeves returns with the first in a brand new series set in North Devon and featuring Detective Matthew Venn. In this rural idyll, where two rivers meet, crime is always there waiting to rise from the water.General adult

Note:Translated from the NorwegianFollowing the dramatic conclusion of number one bestseller 'The Thirst', 'Knife' sees Harry Hole waking up with a ferocious hangover, his hands and clothes covered in blood. Not only is Harry about to come face to face with an old, deadly foe, but with his darkest personal challenge yet.General adult

Note:On one life-changing summer 16-year-old Charlie meets Fran. This is a hymn to the tragicomedy of ordinary lives, a celebration of the reviving power of friendship and that brief, blinding explosion of first love that perhaps can only be looked at directly once it has burned out.General adult

Note:When the van door slammed on Offred's future at the end of 'The Handmaid's Tale,' readers had no way of telling what lay ahead. With 'The Testaments,' the wait is over. Margaret Atwood's sequel picks up the story 15 years after Offred stepped into the unknown, with the explosive testaments of three female narrators from Gilead.General adult